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Michael Meyer and the naysayers, nostalgically bewail the loss of old Beijing.
迈克尔·迈耶和反对者缅怀地悲叹老北京的消失
How old is that old Beijing, and is the loss of the old necessarily bad?
老北京有多老，老的消失真的是坏事吗?
For the most part, Beijing is not old at all.
从很大程度上说，北京一点都不老
As Madeleine Weidong argues so convincingly, much of the cities physical makeup as you see it today,
就像麦德林·伟东具有说服力的论断，很多你如今看到的城市的修补
intellectual traditions and social mores date from the Republican Period.
思想传统和社会风俗可以追溯到共和时期
The first three decades of the 19th century, when Beijing has walled off the Forbidden City's introverted fatalism,
19世纪的前30年，当北京已经打破紫禁城的自主宿命论
began to politicize their urban space, adopted new technologies from rickshaws to electric trolleys and adapted their way of life rapidly,
开始政治化他们的城市空间采用新的技术，黄包车变成电动手推车并迅速调整了生活方式
if awkwardly, to the demands of modernity.
有点尴尬地，调整以适应现代的需求
As the population swelled, and the economy neglected for 100 years by opiate besotted princes and parasitic eunuchs deteriorated,
随着人口膨胀和经济停滞100年，因为鸦片毒害了糊涂的王侯和宦官们使其恶化
courtyard homes had suffered subdivision after subdivision with ramshackle additions sprawling into their once spacious courtyards.
四合院家庭经历了分家，在分家之后摇摇欲坠的因素蔓延，蔓延进他们曾经宽敞的四合院
Neglected too was infrastructure.
基础建设也被忽略
When the last emperor abdicated in 1912, unpaved roads were dust bowls in the dry winter and mud baths in the rainy summer.
当最后一个皇帝在1912年被废除。未铺的路在干燥的冬天如同盛灰的碗，在下雨的夏天就像泥浆浴缸
